The popular social media platform TikTok denies allegations from a tech insider that its algorithm is boosting the campaign of socialist New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani while undermining one of his opponents.
Mamdani surprised many when he won the Democratic primary in the mayoral race and defeated former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who came in second. Cuomo is currently running as an independent.
Cuomo attacked Mamdani during two debates for his inexperience and extremism, but polls show Mamdani remains popular among NYC voters.
Dodeles said that within politics, two terms stood out for nonorganic excessive publicity: Mamdani and Cuomo.
On Wednesday, Tel Aviv-based software engineer and tech founder Yehonatan Dodeles posted a report at Medium claiming that TikTok was pushing users to the Mamdani camp.
“TikTok’s algorithm is distorting the playing field in New York City’s mayoral race,” Dodeles wrote. “Our early analysis suggests that content favoring Zohran Mamdani is being amplified, while videos supporting Andrew Cuomo are being suppressed, a pattern that could meaningfully influence public perception and voter behavior.”
The analysis was based on a computer model that compared how many times some content was boosted as compared to the user-engagement levels. Dodeles said that within politics, two terms stood out for nonorganic excessive publicity: Mamdani and Cuomo.
The analysis estimated that anti-Cuomo content received 54% excessive publicity, while that seen as pro-Mamdani received 3% excessive publicity when normalized against the baseline for politics.
Ironically, pro-Cuomo content had exactly the same excessive publicity rating as anti-Mamdani content: -22%
Dodeles went on to say that the analysis took into account the natural popularity that the topics have among the platform users.
TikTok released a statement vehemently denying the report.
“This is nothing more than a deliberate attempt to push a political objective through a bogus study that is not based on any form of reality,” read the statement. “The story falls well short of basic journalistic standards.”
TikTok has been previously criticized for allegedly orchestrating its algorithm to damage American society while precluding the same content in China.
Steve Baker, investigative journalist for Blaze News, cited his recent report documenting SIM farms used by China to destabilize U.S. society to provide support for the accusations.
“Our sources tell us that the Chinese control TikTok directly through native onboard bots that cannot be detected whatsoever,” wrote Baker. “Of course the Chinese are brainwashing people to vote for Mamdani. No candidate for NYC mayor would harm America more than Mamdani.”
The platform has also been accused of favoring anti-Israel content while suppressing that which defends the nation amid the conflict with the Hamas terror group.
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The post TikTok denies boosting pro-Mamdani content while undermining Cuomo’s campaign appeared first on TheBlaze.
